Kerrick signed groveling and crawling as he spoke. “Very little, she of endless knowledge, but enough to know that you are the master of life.”

“That is true. At least you have intelligence enough to appreciate even if you cannot understand. Look in wonder at this creature.” Akotolp pushed one of her assistants aside and gestured at a knobbed and spiked, multicolored creature that squatted beside a transparent section of the wall. Bright sunlight shone against what appeared to be a great eye in its side. Disconcertingly, it had another eye in the top of its head. Akotolp signaled Kerrick forward, then wobbled with mirth at his reluctance.

“You are afraid of it?”

“Those eyes. . .”

“They cannot see, stupid one. It is blind and senseless, the eyes modified for our use, lenses to bend light so we can see the unseen. Look here, on this transparent plate, what do you see?”

“A drop of water?”

“Amazing observation. Now watch when I place it into the sanduu.” Akotolp prodded with her thumb until an opening appeared in the sanduu’s side, then slipped the plate into it. She then squinted into the topmost eye, grunting to herself as she thumbed the sanduu with instructions. Satisfied, she straightened up and signaled Kerrick to her.

“Close one eye. Look in here with the other. Tell me what you see.”

He saw nothing. Just a blur of light. He blinked and moved his head—then saw them. Transparent creatures with rapidly moving tentacles. He could not understand it and turned to Akotolp for assistance. “I saw something, moving beasts, what were they?”

“Animals, minute ones, there in the drop of water, their images magnified by the lenses. Do you know what I am talking about?”

“No.”

“Exactly. You will never learn. Your intelligence is equal to that of the other ustuzou behind you. Dismissed.”

Kerrick turned and gasped when he saw the silent, bearded Tanu standing in the niche in the wall. Then he realized that it was only a stuffed and mounted animal. It meant nothing to him and he left quickly.

Yet he felt strangely disturbed as he walked back, the sun warm on his shoulders, Inlnu* plodding patiently behind. In thought and speech he was Yilanè. In form he was ustuzou. Which meant he was neither one nor the other and he grew upset when he thought about it. He was Yilanè, that was what he was, there was no doubt about that.

Unconsciously, as he told himself this over and over, his fingers pinched at his warm Tanu flesh.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

“The time has come for us to leave,” Stallan said. “It is here in the pictures, everything we need to know.”

“Show me,” Vaintè said. Her aides and the fargi pressed close to see as well, but a gesture drove them back. Stallan passed the pictures over, one at a time, with a careful explanation of each.